The present invention relates to communication networks, and, more particularly, to systems and methods for implementing an energy efficient network infrastructure for communication between distributed processing nodes.
A conventional data processing system often includes multiple distributed processing nodes, where each node runs one or more task specific application programs (“task applications”). A conventional processing node typically corresponds to one of multiple processes or processors within a computer system, one of multiple single board computers within a computer system, or one of a multiple computer systems within the conventional data processing system. Task applications running on processing nodes distributed across a conventional network (e.g., computer internal bus, local or wide area network, or Internet) typically communicate with each other using common middleware software, such as Common Object Request Broker Architecture (CORBA) network programming software, that typically requires a significant amount of memory (e.g., 500k-2M bytes or more) and utilizes a significant amount of processor capacity (e.g., 25% or more CPU utilization) and throughput to process message and data communication between the task applications, resulting in substantial power consumption for the respective processing nodes. This problem is of particular concern to data processing nodes that run on batteries or other limited power sources, such as a laptop computer, aircraft avionic computer system, or computer system in a lunar rover or other space vehicle.
In addition, the network infrastructure in a conventional data processing system typically requires one data processing node to coordinate message communication between other distributed data processing nodes or task applications running on those nodes in accordance with scheduled events, resulting in unnecessary polling of messages for data from a respective task application when the data has not changed. Accordingly, the unnecessary polling of task application messages causes processor power for the respective processing node to be consumed or wasted. For example, one conventional data processing system implemented using a standard network infrastructure that exhibits this problem includes a ground based telemetry station having a central processing node operatively configured to communicate and control communication across a wireless network with a sensor task application running on a remote processing node such as a lunar rover. The sensor task application is typically polled by the central processing node of the ground based telemetry regardless of whether the sensor task application has new data, resulting in unnecessary processor power consumption by the remote processing node.
Therefore, a need exists for systems and methods that overcome the problems noted above and others previously experienced for implementing a network infrastructure for communication between distributed processing nodes.